Re: CVS: Symbol's function definition is void: ignore-errors

[Hrvoje Niksic <hniksic@iskon.hr>]

Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org> writes:

> > b) Some of them carry interesting meta-information that is not easy to
> >    transfer, such as instructions for byte-optimizer.  cl.el is
> >    smarter than it appears -- some of the seemingly cluttered function
> >    and macro constructs compile to efficient byte-code.  (See the
> >    various compiler macro definitions in cl-macs.el)
> 
> Yup.  That's why I want the byte-code, not the functions themselves.

But the byte-code doesn't have the whole info.  My point is that, for
instance:

(disassemble
  (lambda () (eql x 'bar)))

...disassembles to code that uses `eq' because it's safe.  OTOH, this:

(disassemble
  (lambda () (eql x y)))

...disassembles to code that uses `equal', because EQUAL has its own
byte-code instruction, and it's faster than calling `eql'.

If you do something like (fset 'gnus-eql (indirect-function 'eql)),
you lose this meta-information.  This is a trivial example, but there
are more.

EQL is a trivial example, but there is more where that came from.
"compiler macros" != "Lisp macros".

> #[(cl-seq &rest cl-keys) "byte code removed" [cl-delete-duplicates cl-seq cl-keys nil] 4 596479]
> 
> Er.  But the cl functions call other cl functions.  Er.  Uhm.  Hm.
> Can I alter the contents of the byte-compiled function to call the
> Gnus functions instead?  My, this is getting rather complicated...

Yup.

> > Maybe it would be a better approach to really really beg Stallman
> > to allow Gnus to use the nice CL thingies.  Gnus is *huge*.  I
> > don't think anyone will notice the difference.
> 
> I think it's mainly a name-pollution thing for RMS.  Having
> `delete-duplicates' in the namespace will make people believe that's
> a proper Emacs function and stuff.

Isn't it, really?  It ships with Emacs, it's GPL-ed, it's assigned to
the FSF, it works nicely, it sings and it cooks for you.  If noone is
supposed to use it, why is it there in the first place?